Indian telecom market competitive, but has great prospects: MTS CEO

Dmitry Shukov, who will take over as President and CEO of Sistema Shyam Teleservices (SSTL) from 1 June, has listed the company’s breakeven as his top priority. Shukov comes with over 20 years of hands-on experience which includes a stint as Head of Sales in Tele2, Russia’s leading mobile operator. Prior to joining MTS India as Deputy CEO (his current position), Shukov was the Chief Executive Office for MTS Turkmenistan and MTS Uzbekistan.

Shukov will lead MTS at a time when much regulatory uncertainty is behind the telecom industry, MTS has relinquished operations in 10 circles and consolidated operations in the remaining 9. MTS is a primarily data customer company and has been focusing on increasing data penetration. But unlike the voice telephony market, there is not much room for price actions in data till now. Shukov says it would take roughly two years for the company to break even and this can only be achieved by increasing the company’s productivity at all levels. In a short chat with Firstpost, Shukov made it clear that India is one of the most competitive telecom markets in the world.

Here are excerpts from the interview:

Firstpost: What are your concerns about India’s telecom market and Sistema’s operations here?

Shukov: My appointment to head the India business is the most exciting career development for me. I have worked in telecom business in Russia, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan but the scale of operation is different in India, it is larger and competition is huge here. India has great prospects for telecom because the economy is growing. It has a great prospect for telecom companies, specially in the data business. At Sistema, we need to find our niche, our share in the data business.

Firstpost: Is acquiring another telecom company or merging with one a priority?

Shukov: First task of mine is to raise productivity of the business in terms of breakeven. This is focus number one. M&A is a non-organic growth possibility and we are open to suggestions and discussions. But regulations are high and don’t see any concrete proposal for M&A before us right now.

Firstpost: Any action on price points in the near future?

Shukov: We will not become more aggressive on price points, our prices are very reasonable now. But if the price grows in the market for data, we will follow.